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Office
of Surface Mining (OSM) Summer Interns at MCRP
2000:
Sarah Endriss
2001: Roman Chiu
2002: Chris Alexander
2003: Josh Long
2004: Tim Clinton
Most
of our past and present staff, interns, and VISTA volunteers
responded to MCRP's request for their comments and thoughts
about working in the watershed during its first ten years.
Their responses were part of a 4-page feature in Up the
Creek,
our newsletter, Summer 2004.
MCRP
Staff
OSM
Summer Interns
VISTA
volunteers
Tenth
Anniversary newsletter (PDF format, 1.6 MB)
MCRP
Home
Photos,
top to bottom:
Josh
Long, OSM summer intern (center) at the Ohio Watershed Leaders
Conference. Photo by Robyn Ness, 2003.
The
first Monday Creek boatbuilding project, 2002: Aaron Christian
and Chris Alexander, OSM summer intern, caulking.
Photo
by Matt Woods.
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Summer
Interns at MCRP
 
SARAH
ENDRISS Congratulations, Monday Creek Restoration Project,
on ten years of invaluable work! The reclamation work that you
have
done and will continue to do is an inspiration to anyone and
everyone who cares about community, history and the natural landscape.
The summer and semesters that I spent working with Mike, Norah,
Ben, Corie and Mitch at MCRP during my graduate studies in landscape
architecture was a wonderful learning experience. Your work is
not always glamorous, nor is it sometimes even recognizable to
those living adjacent to it, but for a young designer bent on
transforming environmental liabilities into community assets,
your work was and continues to be inspirational.
ROMAN
CHIU The day I arrived in the area, I wandered around and found
Mike Steinmaus at the Murray City Chautauqua. I remember it was
a beautiful sunny summer evening driving through Buchtel up to
Murray City through the curves and to the field.
As I was driving
up there I had no clue what I was getting into! As an Intern,
I found out that "down the road" meant 10 or 15 miles down the
road or up the mountain (that was the hard way), "crick" was
the little stream, and "sulfur crick" was the acid mine drainage.
Even though my time in the region was only for a few months,
I was able to experience a spectacular Fourth of July in Murray
City with the Volunteer Fire Department, which I heard is the
best fireworks show in the area and probably the county!
There
were the senior center lunches putting together puzzles, hanging
out at the Pantry and the Station in Murray City listening to
all the stories they had to tell about the town.
I watched the
Murray City video and asked questions about the coal mining and
railroad gear. "They really used canaries to tell if there was
bad air in the mines?"
And after a long day of working hard and
hanging out, Floyd Keeton would give me potatoes, lettuce, and
candy bars, which got me by that summer in southeastern Ohio. This
experience led me to graduate school, where I am learning more
about design and the environment. I constantly see that I am
using what I learned that summer at Monday Creek in school and
places I worked.
JOSH LONG As an OSM Watershed Intern for the
Monday Creek Restoration Project (MCRP) over the fall of 2003,
I experienced firsthand the ongoing reclamation
effort conducted in the Monday Creek Watershed.
From the analysis
of a previous survey of Monday Creek Watershed residents
and a current survey I conducted I was able to see a distinct
increase in the viewed importance of both certain environmental
issues (water pollution from human sewage, litter, loss of
wildlife habitat, etc.) and possible environmental solutions
(more jobs, more health department inspections, abandoned
mine reclamation, etc.). This increase shows the concern
residents have about their watershed. I am proud to have been a
small
part of this progress.
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